


Song for a Winter's Night

by kiashyel



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Christmas, Light Angst, Loneliness, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:55:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27765568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiashyel/pseuds/kiashyel
Summary: If I could only have you nearTo breathe a sigh or twoI would be happy just to hold the hands I loveOn this winter night with youAnd to be once again with youDavid is alone on Christmas Eve and waiting for Patrick to come home.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer & David Rose, Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 15
Kudos: 77
Collections: Schitt's Creek: Frozen Over (2020)





	Song for a Winter's Night

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [SCFrozenOver2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SCFrozenOver2020) collection. 



> The given prompt was about winter being David's favorite season but "Song For a Winter's Night" is one of my favorite songs and when I saw it as the title for the prompt I couldn't resist turning its lonely, melancholic vibe into a fic.

Chosen more for ambiance than illumination, the end table lamp throws out a dim light against the darkness of the living room. The air is still and the room is silent as David looks out the window at the softly falling snow. In the reflection of the glass he sees the unlit Christmas tree and bites at his bottom lip. He turns to look at it and lets out an exasperated sigh, one of a million he’s exhaled over the last several days.

If he’d just gone with Patrick to Vancouver they would at least be together on Christmas Eve. Instead, his husband is two thousand miles away trying every way to get home via plane, train, or automobile. David once again curses the death of Great Uncle Myron and the funeral that took Patrick across the country at the holidays. He lets out another exasperated sigh, this time at himself. It wasn’t Myron’s fault that he died right before Christmas. 

David had liked Myron. He always had a smile and a compliment for David’s outfits at the Brewer family gatherings and upon their first meeting had winked at David and guided him to where the good booze was secretly stashed. “Trust me,” he’d said as he poured a healthy glug of whiskey into two red plastic cups, “you’ll need this in you once they start talking about the designated hitter rule.” The man had positively twinkled with mischief and David always enjoyed a place beside him at whatever barbecue or reunion or holiday he and Patrick had gone to celebrate with the extended Brewer clan.

Obviously, Patrick had to go to the funeral. But it was the week leading up to Christmas. They had gift baskets to make, a decoration making workshop to host with one of their vendors, and a private mulled wine tasting scheduled. It was the store’s busiest and most lucrative time of the year and someone had to stay behind and run things.

So David stayed. Alone. At Christmas. 

He checks his phone for the six hundredth time that hour, looking for a message from Patrick and hoping that a holiday miracle has occurred and he’s found some kind of transportation. He swipes his hands over his face and murmurs an “okay” before walking away from the scenic snowfall and moving through to the kitchen. 

At the island, David picks at one of Twyla’s gender nonspecific gingerbread people and pops one of its gumdrop buttons into his mouth. Then he hastily plucks the other two and eats them as well because otherwise the cookie just looks unbalanced and incorrect. He’s just about to denude another cookie when his phone rings. With a startled jump, David hurriedly pulls the phone from his pocket. 

Patrick.  _ Thank god. _

“Patrick, thank god,” David answers. “Any luck?”

There’s a low thrum of overlapping voices and the booming distortion of an overhead announcement before Patrick responds, “I’m on standby at a gate but there’s no guarantee I’ll be flying into Toronto any time soon. There’s a flight into Montreal later that I...”

“Well, standby is something at least,” David interjects, trying for hopeful but falling short of the mark. 

“I’m sorry, David,” Patrick apologizes and his voice is weary. David has lost count of how many times he’s heard those words today. “If I’d known any of this was going to happen I would have insisted you go with Stevie to Alexis’s.” 

“In an ideal world you would have been home yesterday,” David agrees, “but it’s not like you could exactly plan for the airline to cancel one flight and bump you from another. Besides, what was I going to do? Flit off to New York and drink eggnog with Stevie and my sister while you’re stranded in god-knows-where waiting on a flight?”

There’s a beat of silence between them, filled with the tinny sounds of the airport bustle, before Patrick changes the subject. 

“So tell me about the caroling at the store. I know you have opinions.” There’s a teasing lilt in his tone.

He briefly tries to hold it back but a dam breaks open inside of David and his words come out in a rush. “Oh my  _ god _ , Patrick. It was distressing. I just don’t have the words to describe just how wrong it was.”

“I very much doubt that,” Patrick deadpans. “But it couldn’t have been that bad. The Jazzagals are a pretty good group.”

“Mmmkay, you know that I find being sung at particularly traumatizing. And no, you don’t count. My husband  _ serenading _ me with a romantic ballad isn’t the same as a chorus of women loudly  _ assaulting _ me and our customers with a holiday revue.”

There’s a quiet chuckle. “What did they sing?”

David closes his eyes and tips back his head. He’s fought hard to suppress the memory but drags it back into the spotlight. “They started with  _ Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer _ and  _ Frosty the Snowman _ which are thoroughly terrible songs. They’re meant for children and only children should be subjected to them.”

Patrick laughs. “What else?”

“ _ The First Noel _ , which is fine for groups but, fuck, it gets repetitive. I haven’t mentioned that they were singing all of this over my carefully curated playlist of jazz based Christmas songs…”

“You mean the playlist that’s just Chris Botti’s  _ December _ on shuffle?” Patrick interrupts. 

David pauses then concedes, “Okay fine so it’s not _exactly_ curated but it is specifically chosen for its ambiance. Anyway, then - _then_ \- they had the audacity to sing _ O Holy Night _ .”

“No!” Patrick gasps.

David narrows his eyes. “You know it’s my favorite…”

“But it’s not a good caroling song,” Patrick finishes. “I know.” David can hear, can  _ feel,  _ his husband’s smile and his own lips twist into a muted grin.

There’s another beat of silence, quieter this time. David fingers the cuff of his cream colored sweater. “Have you eaten?” he asks like the worried spouse he is.

“I had a wrap earlier. What about you, David? Have you eaten anything besides sweets?”

David turns his back on the plate of gingerbread people. “Jocelyn brought over a pitcher of wassail,” he says. “That’s more spice than sweet.”

There’s a soft  _ tsk _ but Patrick saves his chiding for another time. Before he can speak again, there’s another loud, distorted announcement. 

“That’s me,” Patrick says. “Let’s hope I make it onto this one.”

“Break a leg, honey. Love you,” David tells him and smiles at the breathy chuckle that precedes a reply of “Love you too.”

David puts his phone face down on the island. The light and warmth of Patrick’s voice is gone and the house is dim and quiet once more.

He pulls a mug from its hook beneath the cabinet and opens one of the last bottles of Mrs. Bishop’s mulled wine. He drums his fingers on the counter while he waits and idly thinks the wine deserves better than being heated in the microwave but he can’t be bothered to warm it properly. He punches in the cook time and thinks to himself,  _ “Fuck, this is a lonely and depressing way to spend Christmas Eve.” _

Watching the mug slowly rotate in the microwave, David recalls Christmases past, back when his family had more money than they could ever spend in a lifetime, and remembers he was lonely then too. 

Not consciously lonely, of course, but in a faint way. That vague feeling of emptiness that fluttered against his heartbeat. The fleeting ache of longing in his stomach, in his bones, in his skin. The desperation in the tips of his fingers, greedy to hold on to someone long enough to make the nothingness go away. 

He hasn’t felt that lonely in years. Not since his family made a new life in Schitt’s Creek. Not since he and Patrick kissed on what would have been an otherwise bleak and dismal birthday. Not since they married and have spent all their holidays together, with one family or another or sometimes on their own. 

David has preferences and opinions, of course, but ultimately the details of how they spend their holidays never matters because Patrick is always beside David, a friendly smile on his face, his brown eyes bright and warm. One hand always touching David, grazing his shoulders, his hips, the small of his back. His lips coming close to softly murmur in David’s ear, to whisper suggestively about what they’ll do when they’re alone. David loves it. 

But now he remembers those desolate, unhappy, lonely years and realizes that’s what he’s felt these last several days without Patrick. Lonely. 

They’ve been apart before. They aren’t one of those weird couples who have to do  _ everything _ together but something about the extended darkness in the evenings and the forced holiday cheerfulness during the day makes his solitude more pronounced.

That’s why the loneliness feels so much deeper now than it ever has before. His skin, his heart, his stomach, everything aches with an emptiness he’d thought he’d forgotten. The reminder hurts more than it ever did in the first place.

He thinks of how he used to deal with this sore and aching nothingness that squeezes his heart and pushes against his ribs. A pill washed down with tears and expensive liquor and then the blissful escape of a half a day of sleep. 

He’s home alone and his husband is stuck in Vancouver and it’s Christmas and he doesn’t have pills to pop - not the good ones, anyway - but he has delicious mulled wine, a kitchen full of goodies made by Ray and Twyla and Jocelyn, and a plethora of holiday movies streaming on Interflix.

As he takes a pensive sip of his wine, David’s phone rings.

“Has my sister dragged you to all the hot holiday party spots yet?” he answers.

“Fuck,” comes Stevie’s exhaled response. David suppresses a grin. “We’re going to Brooklyn for some kind of light and music installation from one of her clients. I think? I don’t know. Alexis keeps using lots of buzzwords and insisting it’s the next big thing. Any tips for getting her to speed this along so we can get to the boozy part of the evening?”

“None,” he tells her. “Guess you’ll just have to take in all that Christmas cheer sober.”

“God I hate you,” she mutters.

“The feeling’s mutual,” he says and releases the grin. 

“Have you heard from Patrick? Is he on his way home?” Stevie asks. 

David swallows hard and shakes his head. “I talked to him a few minutes ago. He, um, he’s on standby right now. If he doesn’t make it onto this one the next flight to Toronto doesn’t leave until nine tomorrow morning.”

“I’m sorry, David,” she says sincerely. 

“Thanks,” he whispers and they fall silent for a few moments, letting the New York City traffic fill the quiet on the line. He clears his throat. “Let me know if Alexis takes you to the Christmas karaoke place and I’ll call with a fake emergency. No one should have to suffer through a dozen drunk renditions of Mariah’s  _ All I Want for Christmas is You _ .” 

She laughs. “Thanks. Call if you need anything, OK?”

He nods. “Yep.”

“Bye David. Merry Christmas.”

“Yeah, you too.”

He’s halfway through his first holiday rom-com and nearly finished with his second cup of mulled wine when he receives the texts.

**Patrick:** _Struck out with standby but I’m on the nine o’clock._

**Patrick:** _I can’t find my charger and my phone is at half power so I’m gonna try and conserve battery. I’ll let you know if anything changes._

**Patrick:** _I love you._

David’s eyes prickle with tears and his throat wells with a dark sadness. 

**David:** _ I love you too _ .

He swallows the rest of the wine and the dregs of the leftover spices are bitter on his tongue but the heat of the drink dislodges the emotions pressed against his windpipe. He swipes at his eyes with the back of his hand and mutters “okay” under his breath. It’s a one word mantra that gives him strength and resolve when he feels himself begin to wobble. 

David needs to do something, needs to give himself an activity before he slips from the precipice of melancholy and into the waiting oubliette of depression. 

He starts to FaceTime his parents but checks the time difference and realizes it’s already the middle of the night in Mumbai where his mother is on location filming an independent film with a supposedly “up and coming young auteur whose artistic vision is going to revolutionize the industry.” 

Instead, he slips his phone into his back pocket and goes upstairs. There, David sits on the floor of his and Patrick’s bedroom and opens the cedar chest at the foot of the bed. He removes his sweaters one by one and arranges them on the floor beside him like a chessboard of wool and cashmere. Then he carefully unfurls and refolds each of them, working slowly and methodically. Every so often he stops and rereads the texts from Patrick.  _ Struck out on standby… I’m going to try and conserve battery… I love you. _

Knits sufficiently reorganized, David goes downstairs for another drink. He rinses his mug and switches to Jocelyn’s wassail this time, pouring in a glug of the artisanal spiced rum Stevie brought him and Patrick when she returned from one of her many trips across the States to set up another Rosebud motel. He drums his fingers against the counter impatiently as he watches the microwave timer countdown and pulls the door open as soon as it pings zero. 

He takes a sip of the drink before he remembers to blow on it and the sweet, tangy orange and apple concoction sets fire to the delicate skin of his lips and obliterates his taste buds. It burns red hot down his throat and scalds his insides; his heart stutters against the sudden heat in his chest and he lets out an explosive cough. Frustrated with himself, with Canadian air transit, with Great Uncle Myron, with the universe in total, David sets the mug down heavily on the island and takes out his phone again. He intends to distract himself from his vexation by pulling up a browser to see if his favorite Korean green tea serum is back in stock but Patrick’s message is waiting when he unlocks the screen.

_ I love you. _

His too warm ribs shrink against his lungs and the air feels thin. Staring at the phone clutched tightly in his hands, David wonders if Patrick is lonely too. 

The long winter hours move slowly at night and David plays Mariah at top volume so he doesn’t have to hear the sleek and stylish mantel clock tick them by. It’s almost midnight when he settles back onto the sofa, wraps himself in an afghan, and turns on  _ White Christmas _ . Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye are just beginning the  _ Sisters _ number when David begins to fight against his heavy eyelids but by the time Wallace and Davis board the train to Vermont he falls into a light doze. Against a drowsy eddy of wine and rum, he thinks he hears his phone chime but can’t open his eyes. He slips into sleep and into a dream where Patrick is home, wrapping his hands around David’s waist and pressing a kiss to his neck, to that special spot that is Patrick’s alone. 

When David wakes, the air is still and the room is silent but there’s a chill that hadn’t been there before. Eyelids still shut, he grabs a fistful of blanket and pulls it higher up his chest. Then he feels a touch of cold skin and the scrape of stubble against his jaw. 

Patrick. 

David’s eyelids fly open and his husband is there. Patrick looks travel worn and weary, dark circles under his eyes standing out against his pale skin, but he’s there.

Patrick is home.

David bolts upright and pulls Patrick in for a quick but crushing embrace. The room is still mostly dark, the table lamp throwing out a bit of dim light, but through the windows David sees faint webs of snow drifting across the lawn as the shades of night begin to lift and the air outside is colored the same blue grey of the predawn winter sky. David presses his lips to Patrick’s and welcomes him home with a fervent kiss.

“How?” he asks against Patrick’s mouth. 

“What do you mean how?” Patrick says and leans back, his dark eyes full of exhaustion. 

“How are you here? I thought the next flight to Toronto didn’t leave until nine this morning.”

“I took the flight to Montreal and rented a car,” Patrick explains. “Did you not get my message?”

“What?! No!” David’s voice goes up an octave. He snatches his phone and realizes the battery has died. He forgot to charge it last night. Then he remembers the half-heard chime just as he was falling asleep. “Patrick, you drove  _ all night _ ? That’s so dangerous! You could have fallen asleep at the wheel and…”

“I know,” Patrick says softly. “Call me crazy but it’s Christmas and I wanted to be home with my husband.” He pulls David close and rests his chin on his shoulder. He lets out a tired sigh. “It’s been a long few days. I missed you.”

Patrick presses a kiss to David’s neck, to the spot that’s his and his alone. David closes his eyes at the feeling of Patrick’s lips on his skin. A trickle of warm, morning light spills across the window pane and David takes Patrick’s hands, the hands he loves so much, and drops a kiss to his knuckles. 

“Come on,” David says and chivvies Patrick off the sofa. “Let’s get you to bed.”

“But my suitcase,” Patrick gestures to his luggage which sits just inside the door.

“I’ll deal with your suitcase,” David guides him toward the stairs.

“I need to take a shower,” Patrick tells him. “I’m covered in airport grime and plane germs.”

David dips into their dresser and pulls out a soft white t-shirt and a pair of navy sweatpants. He hands them to Patrick, “We’ll change the sheets later. Right now, you need sleep.”

Patrick changes without quarrel and allows David to tuck him under the duvet. Craving closeness after so many days apart, David lays down beside Patrick and watches him struggle to stay awake.

Voice thick and drowsy, Patrick says, “I missed you, David. I was lonely without you.”

David wants to tell him he was lonely too. So lonely. Patrick is asleep before David can reply but he says softly, “I was lonely without you, Patrick. You have no idea how much.”

David gently kisses his husband’s brow and he smiles. Patrick is home. Patrick is home and the loneliness has vanished with the long winter night. 

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
